In context: Nintendo has turn out to be the most recent gaming firm to draw funding from the federal government of Saudi Arabia. While this will alarm some after the nation’s near-total acquisition of SNK, this is just one of Saudi Arabia’s a number of different gaming-related investments.
This week, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) purchased 5 p.c of Nintendo. By Bloomberg’s estimates, this makes it Nintendo’s fifth-largest shareholder. Nintendo mentioned it solely discovered of the funding from information reviews and declined to touch upon particular person shareholders.
The PIF is a $500 billion fund that’s a part of Saudi Arabia’s home financial coverage. The oil-rich nation desires to speculate over a trillion {dollars} in expertise and different sectors by the center of this decade. Video sport firms are a part of that plan.
Last 12 months, the PIF spent billions on shares of Electronic Arts, Activision Blizzard, and Take-Two Interactive and now owns single-digit percentages of every firm. On January, it acquired esports group ESL Gaming, and in February it bought round 5 p.c of Capcom and Nexon. Most famously, that very same month the PIF took 96 p.c of SNK.
Saudi Arabia could also be trying to study from sport firms to include gaming into its sizable inner improvement ambitions. The PIF is a part of the dominion’s “Vision 2030” plan which additionally includes constructing a city-state alongside the Red Sea, known as Neom. In February, Neom inked a take care of MBC group to construct the Middle East’s first AAA sport studio there.
